Method and system for dynamic textual ad distribution via email

ABSTRACT

A system and method for providing dynamic pay-for-placement advertisements via graphics-enabled email that generates a display of advertisements when the email newsletter is opened so the advertisements displayed are based on rankings at the time the email is opened instead of when the email was generated and transmitted. In one embodiment, a graphical-content email having one or more embedded advertisement image references is provided to one or more email recipients. The advertisement image reference, in one embodiment, may include query string parameters indicating the context of the image reference and/or portion of the image reference (i.e., identifying the image reference as being part of a particular newsletter email), a position of the image reference in the email display, and the like. A URL reference also may be included with each advertisement image reference (.e.g., one URL for each advertisement portion of the image to be retrieved by the advertising image reference).

RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application claims priority to a provisional patent application,U.S. Patent Application No. 60/422,844, filed Nov. 1, 2002, entitled“Method and System for Dynamic Textual Ad Distribution via Email,” stillpending.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

This invention relates to systems and methods for providing dynamicgraphical or textual advertisements via email or other stored electronicdocuments in pay-for-placement or similar advertising systems.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

One form of targeted advertising often used in electronic media is a bidfor placement in broadcast emails targeted to a specific group ofrecipients having one or more interests in common. For example,newsletter emails on a specific topic (e.g., parenthood) often include anumber of Uniform Resource Locator (URL) listings to websites ofadvertisers catering to the specific topic (e.g., a toy store'swebsite), whereupon the recipients of the newsletter email can “click”on the link to view the advertised website via a web browser (an eventherein referred to as a “click-through”).

Advertisers may place a bid on the amount of money to be paid for any“click-through” resulting from the placement of an advertisementincluded in the targeted email. In fact, several advertisers may bidagainst each other for placement, with the highest bidder given priorityover other bidders. For example, the highest bid for a newsletter emailmay be listed first and other bidder's advertisements can be listed indescending order based on their bid. Accordingly, as the cost perclick-through (e.g., bid) for the advertising company increases, thecloser that company's listing is to the most visible or prominent partof the newsletter email (e.g., the top of the newsletter email). Higherplacement of the advertisement in a newsletter email often leads to moreclick-throughs for that advertisement and thus, more traffic to theadvertiser's target web site.

While such pay-for-placement email advertisements provide benefit toadvertisers seeking targeted advertising mechanisms, the email provideroften does not experience the full revenue potential possible from thepay-for-placement advertising in the emails. Common pay-for-placementemail advertising systems typically do not take into account variationsin the relationship between the advertiser, the email provider, and thecontent of the newsletter emails. To illustrate, advertiserscontinuously change their bids for advertisement placement,relationships with new advertisers may be developed, relationships withadvertisers may be ended, new advertisements may be available, etc.

While the relationship between an advertiser and the email provider maybe fluid, a newsletter email typically is persistent, being delivered torecipients' mailboxes typically within minutes of being sent. Thenewsletter then may reside in a recipient's mailbox for an unknownperiod of time (e.g., for minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, etc.)after it was originally delivered before the recipient views thenewsletter email. During this variable time period, the relationshipbetween the newsletter email provider and the advertisers havingadvertisements listed in the delivered newsletter email may havechanged. For example, some or all of the listed advertisers' accountsmay have been depleted of money, some or all of the listed advertisersmay no longer have a relationship with the pay-for-placement emailprovider, the relative ranking of the bids by advertisers may havechanged in the duration, and the like. Accordingly, the arrangement ofthe advertisement listings in the original newsletter email when sentmay not reflect the arrangement of advertisement listings that is mostadvantageous to the email provider at the time that the newsletter emailis opened by a recipient.

To illustrate, an advertiser, based in its bid, may be listed in themost prominent position at the time of transmission of a newsletteremail. In the time period between the transmission of the email and theviewing of the email by a recipient, however, the advertiser terminatedits relationship with the newsletter email provider and, therefore, nolonger has a paying relationship with the email provider. Accordingly,any click-throughs to the terminated advertiser resulting from therecipient clicking the terminated advertisers listing in the newsletteremail is, in essence, lost revenue for the email provider since theterminated advertiser receives these click-throughs for free. In asimilar manner, any changes in the bids or rate of click-throughs forthe advertisers since transmission would not be reflected in theadvertising listings in the email as transmitted. As a result, the emailprovider may not realize its full revenue potential had the advertisinglistings in the newsletter email reflected the optimum advertisinglisting arrangement at the time the email was viewed by a recipient.Other drawbacks exist with current techniques for targeted advertisingvia email.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

Embodiments of the present invention mitigate or solve theabove-identified limitations in known solutions, as well as otherunspecified deficiencies in known solutions. A number of advantagesassociated with the present invention are readily evident to thoseskilled in the art, including economy of design and resources, greatersystem flexibility, cost savings, etc.

At least one embodiment of the present invention provides a system andmethod for providing dynamic pay-for-placement advertisements viagraphics-enabled email that generates a display of advertisements whenthe email newsletter is opened so the advertisements displayed are basedon rankings at the time the email is opened instead of when the emailwas generated and transmitted. In one embodiment, a graphical-contentemail having one or more embedded advertisement image references isprovided to one or more email recipients. The advertisement imagereference, in one embodiment, may include query string parametersindicating the context of the image reference and/or portion of theimage reference (i.e., identifying the image reference as being part ofa particular newsletter email), a position of the image reference in theemail display, and the like. A URL reference also may be included witheach advertisement image reference (.e.g., one URL for eachadvertisement portion of the image to be retrieved by the advertisingimage reference).

When the email is opened in a graphics-enabled email client, the emailclient interprets instructions in the email to request the one or morereferenced advertisement images from a advertisement system. Theadvertisement system, in one embodiment, is adapted to determine apreferred advertisement layout in response to the image request. Theadvertisements included in the preferred advertisement layout may thenbe based in part on the current relationships (i.e., at the time theemail is opened) between the content provider and its pay-for-placementadvertisers, the placement of the advertisement in the email display, ora combination thereof. The advertisement system then provides the emailclient with advertisement images that correspond to the preferredadvertisement layout at the time the email is opened. In addition toproviding the advertisement image or images requested by the emailclient displaying the transmitted email, the advertisement system alsocan be adapted to store a browser cookie at the email client, where thebrowser cookie stores a reference to the particular advertisement layoutdisplayed in the email.

A referenced advertisement image in the email can include a graphicalimage, a graphical representation of text, or a combination thereof.Further, two or more advertisement listings can be grouped togetherunder a single image with certain portions of the single image beingassociated with each of the advertisement listings using, for example,an HTML image map.

Upon receipt of the advertisement image(s), the email client displaysthe email content along with the supplied advertisement images asdirected by the email. Should the email recipient “click” one of thedisplayed advertisement images, in one embodiment, the email clientsends a request for the website referenced by the associated URLreference. The browser cookie reference to the particular advertisementlayout may be included in the request. Upon receipt of the websiterequest, the advertisement system directs the email client (or a webbrowser of the email recipient) to display the content of acorresponding advertiser's website. In one embodiment, the advertisementsystem identifies the corresponding website using the browser cookiereference included in the webpage request from the email client, aposition indicator associated with the selected advertisement image, andthe like. After the email client (or web browser) is successfullydirected to the corresponding website of the selected advertiser, theadvertisement system may record the “click-through” for billingpurposes.

One embodiment comprises a computerized advertisement distribution anddelivery system for dynamically delivering advertisements for inclusionin an electronic document delivered to and stored at a recipient system.The computerized advertisement distribution and delivery systemcomprises an advertisement image generation module that generates animage containing a plurality of advertisements related to a specificdistribution subject based on a relationship between thoseadvertisements and storing that image in association with anetwork-based locator as being the up-to-date image for the specificdistribution subject. The system may also include an advertisementrelationship determination module intermittently determiningrelationships between advertisements related to a specific distributionsubject and if an existing relationship between advertisements relatedto a specific distribution subject changes, initiating the advertisementimage generation module to generate as modified up-to-date image storedin association with the network-based locator and specific distributionsubject.

In addition, the system comprises an electronic document transmissionsystem that creates and transmits an electronic document containingcontent related to a specific distribution subject and a network-basedlocator associated with the image generated by the advertisement imagegeneration module for the specific distribution subject. Anadvertisement image transmission system then receives a request for theimage located at the network-based locator specified in the electronicdocument transmitted by the electronic document transmission module andtransmitting the up-to-date image stored in association with thenetwork-based locator at the time the request is received. All suchsystems may cooperate with an advertisement input receiving system forreceiving at least one advertisement associated with a specificdistribution subject and a bid representing an amount to be paid forclick-throughs by end-user recipients to a target site associated withthe advertisement.

In these systems, a variety of advertisement relationship determinationsmay be employed to determine which advertisements to provide in theimage(s). In one iteration, the advertisement relationship determinationmodule evaluates a grouping of advertisements based on the effectiverevenue efficiency of the grouping compared to other potential groupingsof advertisements provided by advertisers for the specific distributionsubject and determines the relationship for generating an image usingthe highest revenue efficiency grouping of a predetermined number ofadvertisements. More specifically, the system may generate a ranking oflistings as a grouping, the grouping comprising the ranked list ofadvertisements with the highest effective cost per thousand impressions.Also or alternatively, the revenue efficiency value may be calculated bymultiplying the number of click-throughs over a predetermined number ofimpressions times the bid amount for the advertisement. Theserelationships may be re-evaluated whenever a new bid is received (eithera new advertiser or a modification to an existing bid) or when revenueefficiency calculations are made (e.g., every thousand impressions).

Moreover, the electronic document may include a target network-basedlocator for each of a plurality of advertisements included in the imageand the system may thus provide a redirection server for receiving arequest at the target network-based location and redirecting the requestto a location associated with the advertisement associated with thetarget network-based locator in the electronic document.

One embodiment of an electronic document (e.g., email newsletter in HTMLformat) may comprise program interpreted code for instructing arecipient program to present content related to a specific distributiontopic in a page when the electronic document is opened by the recipientprogram, to retrieve an image from a source network-based location andpresent that image in the page with the content related to the specificdistribution topic when the electronic document is opened by therecipient program, to request a first web page from a first targetnetwork-based locator when a first portion of the image is selected, andto request a second web page from a second target network-based locatorwhen a second portion of the image is selected. And, in one iteration,the first and second target network-based locators direct the recipientprogram to a location on the network where a first and second advertiserweb page location respectively are stored.

In various iterations, the source network-based locator comprises a URLwith an identifier related to the specific distribution subject. Also,it is possible to provide an electronic document in which the first andsecond target network-based locators comprises an address portion and avariable portion and wherein the address portion of the first and secondtarget network-based locators is the same.

According to another embodiment, a computerized advertisementdistribution and delivery system for dynamically deliveringadvertisements for inclusion in an electronic document delivered to andstored at a recipient system may provide an advertisement imagegeneration module for generating a plurality of images corresponding toa specific distribution subject, ordering those plurality of imagesbased on a relationship between those advertisements and storing thoseimages in association with a plurality of network-based locators asbeing the up-to-date image grouping for the specific distributionsubject. This embodiment's system may also provide an advertisementrelationship determination module for intermittently determiningrelationships between advertisements related to a specific distributionsubject and if an existing relationship between advertisements relatedto a specific distribution subject changes, initiating the advertisementimage generation module to reorder the images and store the reorderinginformation to generate a up-to-date image grouping stored inassociation with the plurality of network-based locators and specificdistribution subject. The electronic document transmission system maycreate and transmit an electronic document containing content related toa specific distribution subject and at least two of the plurality ofnetwork-based locators associated with the up-to-date grouping of imagesgenerated by the advertisement image generation module for the specificdistribution subject. Further, an advertisement image transmissionmodule may receive a request for the up-to-date images located at the atleast two of the plurality of network-based locators specified in theelectronic document transmitted by the electronic document transmissionmodule and transmitting the up-to-date images associated with theplurality of network-based locators stored in association with thenetwork-based locator at the time the request is received. Othervariations described above with respect to the first embodiment may alsobe employed.

Other objects and advantages of the present invention will be apparentto one of ordinary skill in the art upon review of the descriptions anddrawings provided.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The purpose and advantages of embodiments of the present invention willbe apparent to those of ordinary skill in the art from the followingdetailed description in conjunction with the appended drawings in whichlike reference characters are used to indicate like elements, and inwhich:

FIG. 1 depicts a system for distribution of advertisements based on anoptimized efficiency-based ranking methodology for a bid-basedadvertisement system according to an embodiment of the presentinvention.

FIG. 2 depicts an advertiser listings provider system and database foruse in the system of FIG. 1 according to an embodiment of the presentinvention.

FIG. 3 depicts a graphical user interface for use in enabling a user tocreate an account as the first step in providing an advertisement fordistribution through Internet channels according to an embodiment of thepresent invention.

FIGS. 4( a)-(b) depict a graphical user interface for use with listingone or more bid-based advertisements for use in a ranked placementkeyword output system according to an embodiment of the presentinvention.

FIG. 5 depicts a graphical user interface for use in confirming one ormore advertisement listings made by an advertiser according to anembodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 6 depicts a graphical user interface for enabling an advertiser toplace a content-based advertisement in a ranked placement system whereinthe content-based system provides for advertising at different levels ofgranularity including category level, channel level and document levelaccording to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 7 depicts a graphical user interface for enabling selection of asubject level for placement of an advertisement according to anembodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 8 depicts a graphical user interface for enabling selection of adocument level for placement of an advertisement according to anembodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 9 depicts a graphical user interface for enabling an advertiser toconfirm the categories in which the advertisement is to be placedaccording to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIGS. 10( a)-(b) depicts graphical user interfaces for enabling anadvertiser to provide one or more advertisements associated with acontent-based advertisement bid in a ranked advertisement distributionsystem according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 11 depicts a graphical user interface for enabling the confirmationof advertisement listings for listings made on category leveladvertisements according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 12 depicts a graphical user interface for enabling an advertiser toprovide contact information step of listing an advertisement on levelnodes according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 13 depicts a graphical user interface for enabling an advertiser toprovide billing information step of listing an advertisement on levelnodes according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 14 depicts a graphical user interface for enabling an advertiser tocreate an account to list an advertisement on level nodes according toan embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 15 depicts a schematic diagram representing a system whereby anadvertiser may list advertisements in subject matter specific nodeswithin a structure of subject matter specific nodes according to anembodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 16 depicts a table providing an example of data collected during anevaluation of ranking of advertisements for a specified keyword within akeyword-based advertisement distribution system according to anembodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 17 depicts a table providing an example of data collected andgenerated during an evaluation of ranking of a plurality ofadvertisements with a keyword and content-based advertisement contextaccording to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 18 depicts an exemplary content distribution page whereinadvertisements are distributed in ranked order for the page based on anefficiency-based ranking system.

FIG. 19 depicts a table providing an example of data collected andevaluated for a plurality of advertisements by a single advertiser overvarious time periods to determine the optimal advertisement for theadvertiser at various times according to an embodiment of the presentinvention.

FIG. 20 depicts a system for distribution of an email havingadvertisements dynamically selected based on a bid-based advertisementselection technique according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 21 depicts a system for dynamically selecting and displayingadvertisement images in an email display according to an embodiment ofthe present invention.

FIG. 22 depicts a method for dynamically selecting and displayingadvertisement images in an email display according to an embodiment ofthe present invention.

FIG. 23 depicts a presentation of an electronic document with contentand images for dynamic display according to an embodiment of the presentinvention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF EMBODIMENTS

Embodiments of the present invention deliver up-to-date and timelyadvertisements. One system embodying various aspects of the presentinvention is depicted in FIG. 20. FIG. 20 depicts a system forgenerating and distributing graphics-enabled email having advertisementimage references that are resolved at the time of display of the emailin accordance with at least one embodiment of the present invention. Thesystem may include content/advertisement listing provider system(s)16/24 that store and serve advertisements and an email provider 50adapted to generate one or more emails having embedded advertisementimage references rather than static text links. The graphics-enabledemail can be generated using any of a plurality of formats, such asHypertext Markup Language (HTML), Dynamic HTML (DHTML), Javascript,Perl, Common Gateway Interface (CGI), and the like.

In one embodiment, each advertisement image reference includes querystring parameters that are used to identify the intended location of theadvertisement image when displayed. Identifiers included in the querystring parameters can include, for example, an identifier associatedwith the email (e.g., identifying the email as a “health” newsletteremail sent on a certain date), a position identifier indicating theintended position of the advertisement image in the email display, andthe like.

In one example, the email provider may generate an HTML-based email. Inthis example, the advertisement image may be stored atcontent/advertisement provider system 16/24 and associated with anidentifier, such as a numeric or name identifier for the newsletter(e.g., 3614 or Sports or Parenting 56). The HTML-email may be generatedwith HTML-encoded content in any of a variety of forms and HTML thatenables the operation of one or more image maps or images withcorresponding target links. The HTML email may then be delivered to theemail clients of some or all newsletter subscribers. Each HTML email mayinclude images that present advertisements, including an embodiment inwhich a single image includes a plurality (e.g., three) advertisementswith portion(s) of the image corresponding to each of the plurality ofads such that those portions may be selected. Upon selection, the enduser's system may request a corresponding web page through a centralserver location at content/advertisement provider system 16/24, forexample. In one iteration, the HTML image map may comprise a sourceimage locator (e.g., URL of an advertisement image operated inaffiliation with the content/advertisement provider system 16/24), HTMLcoding for designating a plurality of portions of the image and aplurality of target network-based locators corresponding to a portion ofthe image. An example of HTML coding to enable the image map to operateis depicted below:

-   -   <TR>    -   <TD colSpan=6><MAP name=sgmap><AREA shape=RECT coords=0,0,600,20    -   href=“http://x.about.com/sg/r/3459.htm?p=0&amp;ref=specsportss        1_sg”><AREA shape=RECT coords=0,55,600,75    -   href=“http://x.about.com/sg/r/3459.htm?p=l1amp;ref=specsportss        1_sg”><AREA shape=RECT coords=0,110,600,130    -   href=“http://x.about.com/sg/r/3459.htm?p=2&amp;ref=specsportss        1_sg”></MAP><IMG height=160    -   src=“http://z.about.com/sg/sg.gif?cuni=3459” width=600    -   useMap=#sgmap border=0></TD></TR>

This section of code includes an image reference atsrc=“http://z.about.com/sg/sg.gif?.cuni=3459”, an indication of theimage's height (160), its width (600) and an instruction to generate anduse an HTML image map named sgmap.

The image map coding identifies portions of the overall image (e.g.,AREA shape=RECT coords=0,55,600,75) and associates each portion with atarget network-based locator (e.g., URL) that links back tocontent/advertisement listings provider 16/24 to be redirected to a website or web page selected by a particular advertiser (e.g.,href=“http://x.about.com/sg/r/3459.htm?p=0&amp;ref=specsportss1_sg”). Inthis example, the image map includes references to three portions andthree URL's differentiated by the “p” number (or position) in the imagemap. The various three references direct a user's system to request aweb page at the advertising system (here, at host server x.about.com)that redirects the request to a web page selected by the advertiserassociated with the corresponding portion of the image map as explainedbelow with reference to FIG. 23.

Each advertisement in an image, in at least one embodiment, isassociated with a URL reference. Accordingly, when a recipient of theemail opens the email for viewing and “clicks” a portion of the imageassociated with the advertisement by the image mapping function, theemail client interprets the HTML in the email and requests and displaysthe website referenced by the URL reference stored at the target siteURL in the HTML email at that time. In one embodiment, as shown in theHTML coding above, the referenced URL may direct the email client to aserver affiliated with the content/advertisement system 16/24, which inturn references a URL from the advertiser whose advertisement has beenplaced in the corresponding position in the image presented at the timeof the selection. As discussed in greater detail below, in oneembodiment, the actual website referenced by the URL reference isdynamically referenced at the time that the email is viewed by the emailrecipient rather than at the time of transmission of the email to therecipient.

In another embodiment, an advertisement section of the HTML email may beencoded to provide a plurality of images, each image comprising one ormore advertisements. Therefore, the encoding described above for asingle image map with three advertisement/portions/target network-basedlocators may be doubled, tripled, etc. to enable different numbers ofadvertisements/image maps. Also, the number ofadvertisements/portions/target network-based locators may be modified asdesired. In addition, an image grouping may be based on a combination ofsingle advertiser images and multiple advertiser image maps, with thegrouping determined based on a revenue efficiency model, as describedherein.

Also, an image may correspond to a single advertisement with a singletarget network-based locator and a plurality of such images may beutilized. Upon that HTML email being opened, each image in the groupingmay be requested and the images provided may be based on therelationship available between advertisements for the specificdistribution subject of the HTML email at the time of the email beingopened.

After generating the email, email provider 50, in one embodiment, isadapted to transmit a copy of the email to the email clients of one ormore intended email recipients over a network 14/22 (e.g., the Internet)using any of a variety of email protocols, such as Simple Mail TransferProtocol (SMTP). Upon receipt, email clients (depicted by email clients28 e-28 g although any number of different email clients may beprovided) typically place the received email in an “inbox,” where it isstored until the recipient directs the email client to open the emailfor display. It will be appreciated that the time period between thereceipt of the email and the actual viewing by the email recipient canvary significantly. For example, one email recipient may view the emailwithin minutes of receipt of the email, whereas other email recipientsmay allow the email to remain unviewed for hours, days, weeks, and evenmonths.

FIGS. 21 and 22 depict a system and method for dynamically displayingpay-for-placement advertising in the email transmitted in FIG. 20 isdepicted in accordance with at least one embodiment. In the illustratedexample, the system includes a content/advertisement provider 16/24adapted to dynamically provide advertisement images to email clients.The advertisement provider of FIG. 21 and the email provider of FIG. 20may include the same provider or may involve different entities.

As noted above, the email generated by email provider 50 (FIG. 20) istransmitted to an email client 28 used by an email recipient andtypically resides at email client 28 for a variable time period untilthe email recipient “opens” the email by directing email 28 client todisplay the content of the email. To display the email content, emailclient 28 typically utilizes an interpreter to interpret any instructioncodes included in the file or data set representing the received email.For example, email client 28 may utilize an HTML browser to interpretand execute HTML commands embedded in the email; a Java plug-in toexecute Javascript or Java applets embedded in the email; a Perlinterpreter to interpret and execute Perl commands; and the like.

As described above, the email, in one embodiment, includes one or moreimage references that reference a location on context provider 16/24 toretrieve a graphical advertisement or graphical representation of atextual advertisement. Accordingly, when the email client prepares theemail content for display, email client 28 uses the image references torequest the corresponding images from content provider 16/24. Uponreceipt of the image request, the content provider may be adapted todynamically select an advertisement image (e.g., representing apay-for-placement advertiser) and provide the selected advertisementimage to the email client for display as part of the email display. Thesteps of selecting and providing advertisement images in response torequests for the images from the email client may be repeated until theemail client has received and displayed all advertisement imagesreferenced in the email. It should be appreciated that such steps mayoccur simultaneously to speed in the delivery time.

In at least one embodiment, the advertisements contained in thereferenced image displayed as part of the email display are selected atthe time the email is opened for display on the email client. Thecontent provider can be adapted to select the advertisements in anyparticular image for display using any of a variety of factors. Asmentioned above, in at least one embodiment, advertisers may place bidsto have their advertisements placed in an email, and/or through othercontent delivery systems as explained below, where the bids preferablyare based on click-throughs (e.g., the advertiser offers to pay $0.50for each click-through to the advertiser's website resulting from anadvertisement displayed in the email). When each advertiser submits anew advertisement for placement in an email, the content provider can beadapted to generate and store an entry in the ad database that includesthe advertisement information, such as an advertisement image, anadvertisement description (e.g., category keywords), the number ofclick-throughs already generated, bid information, and the like (moredetail on embodiments of this aspect of the system is provided below).The entry also can include advertiser information (such as name,address, billing information).

Using the information stored in the ad database entries, the contentprovider can be adapted to select an optimum advertisement image inresponse to an image request from the email client. In one embodiment,the advertisement image can be selected based on bid value. For example,assume that ad #1 has a bid of $0.50 per click-through, ad #2 has a bidof $0.20 per click-through, ad #3 has a bid of $0.25 per click-through,ad #4 has a bid of $0.10 per click-through, ad #5 has a bid of $0.05 perclick-through, and ad #6 has a bid of $0.30 per click-through.Accordingly, for a requested image to be displayed in the most prominentsection of the email display, the content provider could select theadvertisement image associated with ad #1. For a requested image to bedisplayed in the second most prominent section of the email display, thecontent provider could select the advertisement image associated with ad#6, and so on for the remainder of the image requests.

It will be appreciated, however, that the advertiser with the highestbid may not be the advertiser with the greatest number ofclick-throughs. Accordingly, rather than selecting advertisers forlisting in the email solely on bid value, the content provider can beadapted to select advertisers for listing based in part on bid value incombination with the number of click throughs, as well as the relevanceof the advertiser to the topic of interest of the email. For example,assume that ad #1 has a bid of $0.50 per click-through and an average of20 click-throughs/day for the topic of the email (potential total of$10/day), ad #2 has a bid of $0.20 per click-through per click-throughand an average of 100 click-throughs/day for the topic of the email(potential total of $20/day), ad #3 has a bid of $0.25 per click-throughand an average of 10 click-throughs/day for the topic of the email(potential total of $2.50/day), ad #4 has a bid of $0.10 perclick-through and an average of 250 click-throughs/day for the topic ofthe email (potential total of $25/day), ad #5 has a bid of $0.05 perclick-through and an average of 5 click-throughs/day for the topic ofthe email (potential total of $0.50/day), and ad #6 has a bid of $0.30per click-through and an average of 20 click-throughs/day for the topicof the email (potential total of $6/day). To maximize revenue, thecontent provider could select the advertisement image associated with ad#4 for a requested image to be displayed in the second most prominentsection of the email display.

Moreover, the preferred set may be determined based on the optimumcombined value of three advertisers set as a group. For example, it maybe determined that a grouping of Ad #1, Ad #3 and Ad #5 generates themost revenue for content/advertising system 16/24 even though the bidvalues are not the highest individually.

The result set comprising the selected advertisement images and theirintended position in the email display is referred to herein as the“preferred advertisement layout.” In at least one embodiment, thecontent provider is adapted to store a representation of the preferredadvertisement layout in the ad database at a particular date and timebecause the preferred advertisement layout is subject to change as bidsand click-through rates change. Similarly, the content provider, in oneembodiment, is adapted to set a browser cookie at the email client (orweb browser), where the browser cookie includes a reference to thepreferred advertisement layout and the date and time of theadvertisement.

Should a email recipient select one of the displayed advertisementimages, the email client, in one embodiment, sends a request to thecontent provider for the website referenced by the URL referenceassociated with the selected advertisement image within the image of thepreferred advertisement layout. As with the advertisement imagereference in the email, in one embodiment the associated URL referenceis not directed to a particular advertiser's website, but instead is anonspecific URL reference that can be used to identify a particularadvertiser's website based on the context in which the URL reference wasselected. In our earlier example, the nonspecific URL washttp://x.about.com/sg/r/3459.htm?p=0&amp;ret=specsportss1_sg.Accordingly, in at least one embodiment, the email client is adapted toinclude the reference to the preferred advertisement layout included inthe browser cookie stored at the client earlier. Using this preferredadvertisement layout, the advertising system 24 may identify theadvertiser website associated with the selected advertiser image beingdisplayed in the user's email client at that particular moment. Theadvertising system 24 then may provide the content of the advertiserwebsite to the email client (or other web browser) for display as a“click-through.” Once the content has been successfully displayed, theadvertising system 24 may then record the click-through for billingpurposes.

If the preferred advertisement layout for a particular newsletterchanges, the image referenced in the email is changed along with theadvertiser URL's related to each of the nonspecific URL's stored in thedatabase in association with the image. Therefore, without having tomodify any code stored in the email on the email client, differentadvertisements may be displayed dynamically to the user as the preferredadvertisement layout changes.

Moreover, as a result of requesting the current image containing thepreferred advertisement layout when the email is opened each time,advertisers or advertisements that are stale or no longer participatingare not displayed. Such advertisers thus do not get “free”referrals andthe advertisement system does not lose out on an opportunity for revenuefrom the click-through to a no-longer-participating advertiser.

The content/advertisement system 16/24 may comprise a number ofcomponents, as shown below with reference to FIG. 2, for example. Inparticular, relevant to the operations described above, an ad imagegeneration module 42 may be provided to generate an image comprisingportions related to one or more (preferably a plurality) ofadvertisements, such as an image shown in FIG. 23, described below. Thefunctionality for generating an image may comprise computer softwarethat takes data from a database into an image form to prepare acompleted image. Other software may also be used. In addition, an imageserver 44 may be provided to receive requests for images from a databaseand may retrieve images upon request at a specific network-based locator(URL) and variables specifying which image is to be supplied. The imagesupplied may be based on the variable which is used to index andretrieve an image from database 18.

Also, a target redirection server 46 may be provided to receive arequest for a web page upon selection of a portion of an imagecorresponding to an advertisement. The target redirection server 46 mayreceive a request at a specified network-based location and use theparameters to determine the corresponding advertiser.

To provide the functionality of elements 42-46, database 18 may storeimages and target websites all indexed to a specific distributionsubject identifier, such as a number or name. Ad listing generationmodule 32 may intermittently (based on time, new bids, changes in bids,etc.) update the order of ranking of advertisements for a specificdistribution subject and therefore, update the image to be provided andthe advertisement URL's (including changing the position of the URL'sbased on re-ordering that may occur) to which target redirection server46 may redirect the email client when the corresponding advertisement isselected.

Specifically, the flow of steps depicted according to one method of thepresent invention is shown in FIG. 22. In the first step 2202, arecipient receives and stores the electronic document (e.g., HTML email)that contains html encoding specifying at least one reference to animage at the content/advertising system. Next, in step 2204, a timeperiod designated with the letter X takes place. As indicated above, theperiod of time is unknown and therefore any period of time may elapsebetween the user receiving and storing the email and the next step, step2206 of the recipient opening the email. Upon opening an email, in step2208, the email client 28 may load the email and interpret the coding ofthe email, including the reference to an image stored at thecontent/advertising system 16/24. At that point, the email client mayinitiate step 2210 to request the advertisement image/link stored in theemail. As indicated above, an email newsletter may contain one or moresuch references to images that will be stored at the advertising system24.

Step 2214 may occur at the advertisement system 24 to determine thepreferred advertisement image associated with the reference receivedfrom the email client. As indicated above, because the preferredcombination of advertisers in a single image may change, this is donedynamically and at the time of the request. So, for example, based onthe numeral or name designator, a specific image may be generated. Oncethe correct image has been determined, in step 2214, the advertisementsystem 24 may transmit the advertisement image back to the email clientfor display to the user in step 2216. In addition, the advertisinglisting system 24 may deliver a cookie to the email client to be storedon the email client's computer in step 2218. As discussed above, thecookie may contain a number of pieces of information, including anindication of time and date placed and the various information about theimage and the image map delivered to the user. In step 2220, it isdetermined whether each dynamic advertisement in the email has beenreceived and if so, the process of steps 2210, 2212, 2214, 2216 and 2218are repeated. If all such advertisements have been displayed, then instep 2222, a recipient may select one or more of the links depictedwithin the image delivered to the user in step 2222. Specifically, theimage may display what appears to be links, although each is actually aportion of the image map that may be selected as depicted above in theillustrated image map example. If the recipient selects a link, then in2224 the email client transmits a request back to the advertisementsystem at the URL specified in the image map coding as discussed above.And at that point, in step 2224, the user is re-directed to anadvertiser associated with the portion of the image map that the userselected. In addition, for purposes of recording click-throughs andother database recordation techniques, in step 2226, the click-throughis recorded.

An example of an email advertisement and the associated click-throughportions may be shown in FIG. 23. In this figure, the advertisement 60may comprise a number of portions including textual content typicallyprovided in email newsletters. In addition, various advertisement imagesmay be included. In this example, several are depicted, but one isdescribed in greater detail for purposes of illustrating how the imagemap function may work. Here, one of the advertisement images 70 maycomprise three specific advertisements for different makers of DVDsystems or DVD sellers. Here, each of the three advertisements may bedisplayed as part of a single advertisement image 70 but may have aportion of the image depicted as elements 72, 74, and 76 allocated fordisplay of an individual advertiser.

Here, the advertisers have been selected based on a grouping that isdetermined to generate the most revenue for the advertising system: thefirst advertiser has bid 25 cents per click through, the second 21 centsper click through, and the third 24 cents per click through, but thiscombination is better than the combination in which one of theadvertisers may bid 26 cents per click through, for example. Here, anunderlined portion is depicted to show the user that they may selectthat portion of the image to link through to information about thatparticular advertiser. As described above, upon selecting a portion ofthe image map, a URL associated with that portion is activated by theemail client, redirected back to the advertising listing system and thendirected from there to the advertiser ABC, for example, associated withthis particular advertisement.

As will be appreciated, whereas the current grouping of ABC, GHI, andDEF may be the present arrangement of advertisers for this particularemail newsletter, in one week from now, it is possible that ABC willstop participating in advertisement through the advertising listingsystem. Accordingly, if the present image were delivered each time theuser opened the email, it is possible that the user will be redirectedto a web site for ABC and ABC would thus not have to pay or that therewould be a “broken link” when requesting information from ABC. Thepresent system as described above prevents that situation by deliveringthe image each time the email is opened so that each of the advertisersincluded in the image are active advertisers that are participating inthe system and to which the advertising listing system has an activelink for redirecting users requesting further information from thatadvertiser and therefore are capable of generating the revenue from theclick through arrangements as described in greater detail below.

As noted above, any of a variety of techniques may be implemented by thecontent provider to select advertisements for listing ingraphics-enabled emails transmitted to email recipients. In particular,FIGS. 1-19 depict a system and method for generating a ranking ofadvertisements based on revenue efficiency over given periods of time inaccordance with at least one embodiment of the present invention.Although the following describes various embodiments for rankingadvertisements for pay-for-placement advertising in the context of anInternet website, those skilled in the art can readily adapt thefollowing for use in ranking advertisements for placement ingraphics-enabled emails, using the guidelines provided herein.

An embodiment of a networked environment in which such a system mayoperate is depicted in FIG. 1. In such a system, advertisement providers12 connect over a network 14 to an Advertisement Listings Provider 16(e.g., using a secure https connection) to register, provide paymentinformation, bids and associated advertisements (also called creatives)associated with the bid. For example, the advertisers may provide itsbid in association with a keyword for use in a search engine system andmay also provide a bid in association with content on a content portal.The Advertisement Listings Provider 16 then stores the information on adatabase server 18 for later transmittal. The Advertisement ListingsProvider 16 may then distribute the listings through various forums orfeeds, including providing the listings on one or more web sitesaffiliated with the Advertisement Listings Provider, through InternetAdvertising Distribution Partners 20 (connected over network 14 or 22depending on security desired), through Content Systems 24 (withassociated content databases 26) and through Search Engine systemsoperated by the Advertisement Listing Provider or Internet AdvertisingDistribution Partner(s). Through these various forums, theadvertisements provided by the advertisement provider may be included inpages displayed to end users 28 (often called an impression). In oneembodiment, the advertisement provider 12 is only obligated to pay forthe impression if the end user clicks-through the advertisement to theweb page target provided by the advertisement provider in affiliationwith the particular ad. In addition, the Advertisement Listings Provider16 may only be paid when a click-through occurs. Also, traditionally,the Advertisement Listing Provider 16 and Internet DistributionPartner(s) 20 may agree to share the revenue for the click-throughsgenerated through distribution via the Internet Distribution Partner 20.

Each of Advertising Listings Provider 16 and Advertisement Provider 12may comprise computerized systems that include one or more of thefollowing systems: a web server, a database server, proxy server,network balancing mechanisms and systems, and various softwarecomponents that enable the system to operate on the Internet or othernetwork type system. Additionally, networks 14 and 22, although depictedas http networks, may comprise other networks such as private lines,intranets, or any other network. Preferably, the connection betweenadvertising provider 12 and advertisement listing provider 16 maycomprise secure network connections to insure that data is not subjectto attack or corruption by any hacker or other third party. In addition,whereas two advertisement providers are depicted, it should beappreciated that one or more advertisement providers 12 may be providedin the network. Similarly, although one database server 18 is depicted,it should be appreciated that multiple database servers may be providedand that such database servers may be connected to the advertisementlisting provider via any type of network connection, including adistributed database server architecture. Similarly, content system 24and content database 26 may comprise any number of such systemsconnected to the advertisement provider or advertisement listingprovider 16 via any type of network, including an http or https network.Content provider 24 may comprise a system such as advertisement listingprovider 16 that provides functionality for enabling connection over theInternet or other network protocols. End users 28 may comprise any userconnected to the Internet and may comprise computerized systems thatenable that connection through any of various types of networks,including through Internet service providers, cable companies, and anyother method of accessing data on the Internet. Internet advertisingdistribution partners 20 may comprise any system that distributesInternet based advertising to end users. Whereas two Internetadvertising distribution partners 20 are depicted, any number mayactually be provided.

In general, in these embodiments, the Advertisement Listing Provider 16generates revenue when end users click-through to advertisementsprovided by its bidding advertisement providers. The AdvertisementListing Provider 16 may also incur costs for every impression that itreaches in the form of overhead in running a web site or distributionagreements for distribution. Accordingly, the various embodiments of thepresent invention recognize that in such systems, it is revenueefficiency (click-throughs per impression) that generally produces theAdvertisement Listing Provider's profits. By using revenue efficiency torank advertisements then, the Advertisement Listing Provider's rankingstrack its own profitability. This is particularly true for distributionchannels with limited numbers of slots for advertisements. For example,the assignee of the present invention operates an enterprise known asSprinks that distributes advertisements through another enterprise knownas About.com and many others. Within each web page offered on About.com,About.com has allocated space for five advertisements from Sprinks thatare provided by bid-based advertisers that use the Sprinks system. Withonly five spaces for advertisements, it is in Sprinks' interest toensure that each of those five advertisements is effective.

As shown in FIG. 2, the Advertising Listing Provider 16 may comprise asystem that provides an advertisement receiving module 30 forinteracting with advertising providers to receive advertisementinformation. It may also comprise an advertising listing generationmodule 32 that generates a listing of advertisements from the databasebased on criteria provided and depending on the forum for theadvertisements (e.g., search engine, content portal, distributionpartner, etc.). An advertising priority determination module 34 maygenerate an order to the listing based on rankings based on a model. Inone embodiment, the advertising priority determination module 34 maydetermine rankings based on revenue efficiency and utilize aclick-through-rate determination module (also called aClick-Through-Rate Calculator). The resulting advertisements generatedand ranked may then be communicated through various channels. Anadvertiser communication module 38 may also be provided forcommunicating with the advertisers. For example, it may be desired forthe system to alert an advertiser prior to changing the advertisementused for a given bid or before moving the advertisement down or up inthe rankings. A database 18 may be provided in affiliation with theadvertiser listing provider to store advertisements, bids, advertisinginformation and a cache of clicks to be used to determine theclick-through-rate.

Additionally, because Advertising Listings Provider 16 may provide thefunctionality of distributing advertising itself and providing searchengine results, web server system 40 may be provided as well as a searchengine system 42. It should be appreciated that multiple such systemsmay be encompassed within the advertising listing provider system 16.

Additionally, database server system 18 may comprise one or moredatabase systems that store various types of data including one or moreof the following: advertisements, the click cache, bid amountinformation, and advertiser information including registrationinformation about the advertisers, accounts for the advertisers, paymentinformation and other information as described herein. Numerous modulesmay not be provided in various embodiments and/or the modules may becombined together to provide the functionality described. Further, themodules may be dispersed across multiple physical systems or may beduplicated across multiple systems.

FIGS. 16-19 illustrate various examples of the way in which theAdvertising Listing Provider system may implement the revenue efficiencyranking methodology. As shown in FIG. 16, for a given keyword, theadvertiser listing provider may have many different advertisers thathave bid on that keyword for placement in search results from a searchengine implementing a bid-for-placement system. Over a period of time ornumber of impressions, the advertising listing provider system maymonitor and store click-through rates for the effective advertisementfor a given advertiser. For example, for every 1000 impressions, it maybe determined that the primary advertisement provided by higher bidderon the keyword “DVD” generated a 20% click-through rate. Based on itsbid of $0.25 per click-through, that rate generated a revenue perthousand (RPM) of $50.00. Similar data may be tracked for otheradvertisers that bid on the keyword DVD, including advertisers whosesecondary advertisement were already implemented to increase efficiencysuch as the advertiser JKL, Inc. in FIG. 16.

After determining the RPM for each advertiser, the advertiser listingprovider may then take an action, including re-ranking the advertisersfor the keyword DVD based on RPM. In this example, several lower biddersmay be moved up in the rankings because of their relatively highclick-through-rate, indicating the relevancy of their bids. Thus, thesystem monitors and changes the rankings of advertisements for a givenkeyword based on RPM. This monitoring and reevaluation of rankings maybe ongoing and using different periods of time. For example,click-through rates may be monitored hourly, weekly, monthly, etc.

Taking this example, rankings may also be determined by the system forplacement in content portals. For example, instead of bidding on thekeyword “DVD,” the advertisers may be bidding on a page within a contentportal about DVDs. In such a system, a limited number of advertisers maybe displayed within that page, as shown, for example, in FIG. 18. Basedon the new rankings, then the order or placement of the advertisementsin the page may be ABC, GHI and then DEF due to the RPM rates of thosethree advertisements even though ranking by the bid amounts would haveyielded a different result.

Also, as discussed above, the monitoring of RPM may also involve theselection of an active advertisement from a plurality of advertisementsprovided by an advertiser for a given bid. FIG. 17 depicts a table thatindicates a determination that may be made by the advertiser listingprovider system regarding multiple advertisements provided by a singleadvertiser for a given bid. Two examples are provided. In the firstexample, an advertiser ABC, Inc. has bid on the keyword “DVD” andprovided four different advertisements. Over a given time period, theRPM is determined to be higher for Ad #3 and therefore, Ad #3 may bedetermined to be active ad that is displayed in the ranked listings forABC's bid on the keyword DVD. To evaluate alternative ads, the fourdifferent ads may be run at different times, periods, etc. in an attemptto give each ad an opportunity to be viewed by a statisticallysignificant number of viewers and in the relevant time periods. It ispossible that alternative ads may not be used until the click-throughrate for a given ad begins to decrease. Or, alternative ads may bedisplayed for a few hours each week with the active ad being used therest of the week. In that way, alternative ads may be constantlysupplied by the advertiser to see if the alternative ad is moreeffective than the current active ad, but without significant impact ifit is substantially worse than the active ad. In other words, anincentive may be provided for the advertiser to try alternative ads thatmay generate more revenue and more traffic to the advertiser but withoutthe potential penalty of losing ranking against competing advertisers.For example, the alternative advertisement click-through rate may beexcluded from the overall advertisement rate when used for comparisonagainst other bidders.

Similarly, the advertiser DEF, Inc. may have provided two advertisementsfor its bid on the content pages at pregnancy.about.com. After anevaluation period between the two advertisements, it may be determinedthat Ad #1 was still the most effective based on RPM and therefore, maycontinue to be used as the active advertisement.

In addition, the comparison between multiple advertisements may beevaluated over different time periods to determine the highest RPM overdifferent time periods. FIG. 19 depicts an example of a table that mayrepresent the determination made by the advertising listing providersystem in which different time periods within a single day areevaluated. As this example illustrates, it is possible for differentadvertisements to be more effective on a RPM basis at different times ofthe day. Accordingly, the advertisement selected for a bid may be basedon RPM and selected time periods.

Other data may be factored into the evaluation to determine rankingsbased at least in part on revenue efficiency. Demographics of theaudience, distribution channels, country, and other information that isavailable may be fed into the calculation to assist in maximizing theRPM for advertisements for bid-on keywords and content portal pages. Forexample, it may be determined that the ranking should generate differentranked listings for different distribution channels.

According to another embodiment, advertisements may be analyzed ingroupings. The groupings may be based on the known result set expectedby a particular distribution channel. Accordingly, the groupings may beanalyzed separately for each distribution channel as well, withdifferent distribution channels thus receiving a different order andlisting of advertisements optimized to generate revenue through thatchannel. For example, one distribution channel may be a result setexpected to be output for a content portal page. In such an embodiment,a set number of listings may be expected and the system of the presentinvention determines the most revenue-efficient combination of listingsbased on effective revenue per click for the grouping, varying themembers of group over time to determine that most effective grouping.For explanation purposes, assume that there are only four Ads (A,B,C,D)for a given keyword (video games) of which only three listings are to bedisplayed on the feed (in this example the content portal page). In thisexample, advertiser B has provided two creatives, B1 and B2.

To decide the most efficient grouping, the system outputs each of thedifferent combinations over a set period of time and determines theeffective CPM Sum (cost to advertiser (and thus revenue to theadvertisement distribution system) per thousand impressions) for eachmodel. The various combinations are then: AB1C, AB1D, ACB1, ACD, ADB1,ADC, B1AC, B1AD, B1CA, B1CD, B1DA, B1DC, CB1A, CB1D, CAB1, CAD, CDB1,CDA, DB1C, DB1A, DCB1, DCA, DAB1, DAC, AB2C, AB2D, ACB2, ACD, ADB2,B2AC, B2AD, B2CA, B2CD, B2DA, B2DC, CB2A, CB2D, CAB2, CDB2, CDA, DB2C,DB2A, DCB2, DCA, and DAB2.

The Effective CPM Sum for each model may be calculated by summing theCPM (calculated by the equation 1000*Click-Through-Rate*CPC (cost perclick)) of each listing.

If model CB1A yields this:

Unit CTR CPC ECPM C 0.00151 .42 .6342 B1 0.00145 .43 .6235 A 0.00148 .36.5328Then the Effective CPM Sum is:CB1A 1.7905

If model CB2A yields this:

Unit CTR CPC ECPM C 0.00151 .42 .6342 B2 0.00149 .43 .6407 A 0.00148 .36.5328Then the Effective CPM Sum is:CB2A 1.8077

This would indicate that CB2A is superior to CB1A.

Through this embodiment, ads are not compared to one another inisolation, but rather in the grouping that generates the most revenue.This embodiment recognizes that diversification of advertisements maygenerate more revenue due to the diverse interests of viewers. Forexample, a web page on a content portal related to video games mayattract viewers that have many different game platforms. If all of theadvertisements relate to sales of games only compatible with a singleplatform, the grouping may lack any advertisement of interest to theviewer.

To enable advertisers to interact with the system, a web-based Internetsystem may be provided as shown in FIGS. 1 and 15, for example. In suchan embodiment, Advertisement Providers 12 submit their advertisementlistings to the Advertisement Listings Provider 16. It is understoodthat any number of Advertisement Providers 12 may submit advertisementlistings to the Advertisement Listings Provider 16. Advertisementlistings may include all or part of the following information fields:the name of the Advertisement Provider, a title of the advertisement, adescription of the goods or services advertised, a URL to be displayedin the listing, a where an end user will be directed upon clicking onthe advertisement, contact information, an email address, billinginformation, pricing information, and an advertisement identificationnumber. In one embodiment of the present invention, the AdvertisingListing Provider 16 ranks the advertisement listings submitted andstores the ranked listings in a Database Server 18. According to aspecific embodiment, the rankings are generated based on anefficiency-based model as described above.

As discussed above, various embodiments of the present invention may beutilized in an advertising system based on content-based placement. Anembodiment of a content-based placement system in which thisefficiency-based ranking methodology may be utilized is described in arelated patent application entitled “Method and System For ProvidingAdvertising Through Content Specific Nodes Over the Internet,”Application No. 60/396,033 filed on Jul. 18, 2002. For completeness, adescription of the operation of such a system is provided below, asmodified to incorporate the provision of multiple advertisements by asingle advertiser for the single-advertiser efficiency determinationmethodology as described above. This system is described in the contextof FIGS. 3-15 below. It should be appreciated, however, that othersystems for enabling input of advertisements may be used as well withinthe scope of the present invention.

FIG. 3 depicts a graphical user interface 300 that enables a user to“sign up” according to an embodiment of the present invention. A userdesiring Internet advertising may access the system via a securedInternet connection. This embodiment depicts the process for a singleuser desiring Internet advertising to sign up, however, any number ofusers may access the system to purchase content node advertising. FIG. 3shows the instigation of the process with the creation of a username andpassword to create a safe and secure system. There are other ways toaccomplish the security aspect of the present invention, such as directnetwork connections, or subsequent verification by the user desiringInternet advertising.

FIGS. 4( a)-(b) depict graphical user interface 400 that enables a userto list an advertisement on the Internet associated with a search termaccording to an embodiment of the present invention. As shown, a usermay be provided with multiple graphical user interfaces, one each foreach advertisement associated with a specific bid. It is also possibleto provide a single graphical user interface to enable input of multipleadvertisements corresponding to a bid. In one embodiment, the graphicaluser interface provides inputs for a general search term 402,representing the high level subject matter corresponding to the desiredadvertisement. Furthermore, the user desiring advertising may enter alisting title in input 404. The listing title represents the title theuser desiring advertising wishes to display on the advertisement. Forexample, if the user desiring advertising wishes to sell video gamesmanufactured by a company under the name of “V-G” the listing title maybe “V-G video games” or “V-G video games for sale” or other descriptivealternates. The user desiring advertising may also input a display URLin input 406, which may represent the location of the general websitefor the click through. For example, the V-G user may input a display URLof www.v-g.com. Additionally the user may input a targeted URL in input408, which represents the actual URL of the site the end-user will bedirected to if they click on the advertisement. This may be differentfrom the display URL, for example, in that it directs the end-user to aparticular model of video game on sale (e.g., www.v-g.com\modeV52.html).Also, only a single URL may be input and the displayed URL may be theURL of the site to which the end-user may be directed by clicking on theadvertisement. In this embodiment, the user desiring advertising mayalso input a description of the goods or services being advertised ininput 410. Further, the user desiring advertising may submit a price ininput 412. In an embodiment of the present invention, the pricing of theadvertisements is accomplished via a bidding system. Each proposedadvertisement listing has a bid price associated with it. In thisembodiment, the listings are subsequently listed in descending order ofbid prices for the specific level being displayed. The prices may be aper click through price or a flat rate, or as discussed above, a RPMranking. The proposed listing end user may view the proposed listing inthe proper order when the end user searches the web site for the searchterm or terms.

FIG. 5 depicts a graphical user interface 500 that enables a user toconfirm listing an advertisement on the Internet associated with asearch term according to an embodiment of the present invention. Thisgraphical user interface allows the user desiring advertising to seewhat position their add would hold in the descending order ofadvertisements based upon the pricing previously submitted. In a RPMsystem, the ranking shown may be based on the price bid initially or maybe based on the overall average click-through-times-bid amount, forexample. If the user desiring advertising is not satisfied with the rankshown, or otherwise desires to adjust the rank of the listing, the usermay accomplish this by choosing the edit button associated with thatparticular listing.

FIG. 6 depicts a graphical user interface 600 that enables a user toselect a channel level node when listing an advertisement on level nodesaccording to an embodiment of the present invention. In this step thesystem may use the search terms previously entered to suggest documentlevel nodes. This option may be accomplished under “Choose CategoriesBased Upon Keyword.” Also, the user desiring advertising may specify acategory appropriate to the goods or services advertised under ChannelLevel Nodes. Changing examples, if the advertiser was a breast pumpmanufacturer, the advertiser may select “Parenting and Family” as theChannel Level Node. The screenshot shows sample general subject matters.This list is not meant to be all inclusive. Any other subject mattertopic may be appropriate.

FIG. 7 depicts a graphical user interface 700 that enables anadvertising user to select a subject level node when listing anadvertisement on level nodes according to an embodiment of the presentinvention. In this graphical user interface, the system may use thesearch terms previously entered to again suggest document level nodes.This option may be accomplished under “Choose Categories Based UponKeyword.” Also, the user desiring advertising may specify a categoryappropriate to the goods or services advertised under Subject LevelNodes. Continuing the example of the breast pump manufacturer desiringadvertising, the user may select “Pregnancy/Birth” as the Subject LevelNode. The graphical user interface of FIG. 7 provides an example ofsubject level nodes. This list is not meant to be inclusive. Any othersubject matter topic may be appropriate and is preferably more specificthan the subject matters listed as channel level nodes. The listingoptions that appear under the subject level nodes depend upon whatselection the user desiring advertising made under the channel levelnode.

FIG. 8 depicts a graphical user interface 800 that enables a user toselect a document level node when listing an advertisement on levelnodes according to an embodiment of the present invention. In thisgraphical user interface, the system may use the search terms previouslyentered to suggest document level nodes. This option may be accomplishedunder “Choose Categories Based Upon Keyword.” Also, the advertisementprovider user may specify a category appropriate to the goods orservices advertised under Document Level Nodes. Continuing the exampleof the breast pump manufacturer desiring advertising, the user mayselect “Breastfeeding” as the Document Level Node. The graphical userinterface 800 provides an example of general subject matter nodes. Thislist is not meant to be all inclusive. Any other subject matter topicmay be appropriate, and preferably is more specific than the subjectmatters listed as subject level nodes. The listing options that appearunder the document level nodes depend upon what selection the userdesiring advertising made under the subject level node.

FIG. 9 depicts a graphical user interface 900 that enables anadvertising provider user to confirm listings according to an embodimentof the present invention. If listings appear that the user desiringadvertising does not wish to purchase, the user may so indicate such as,for example, by unchecking the corresponding box.

FIGS. 10( a) and (b) depicts graphical user interfaces 1000 and 1050that enable a user to enter detailed listing information for variousadvertisements corresponding to the level-node content bid entered. Inone embodiment, this step is individually accomplished for each desireddocument level node listing. For example, in FIGS. 10( a) and (b), twodifferent alternative ads are provides, so the node-based ad is providedfor each separate bid—one in graphical user interface 1000 and one ingraphical user interface 1050. In one embodiment, the relationalstructure of the nodes chosen is represented in the listing name shownat the top of the graphical user interface 1000 and 1050. The user maythen input a listing title, a display URL, a targeted URL, a descriptionand a price in input areas 1002, 1004, 1006, 1008 and 1010,respectively.

FIG. 11 depicts a graphical user interface 1100 that enables a user toconfirm bids to list an advertisement on different level nodes within agiven content portal according to an embodiment of the presentinvention. Once user has provided inputs in the GUI 1000/1050 for eachdesired document level node listing, the listings may be displayed inGUI 1100. Along with the information input by the user desiringadvertising, the system may also display the rank the user would occupywith the price previously submitted for each listing. This GUI 1100enables the advertiser to gauge its potential response by its ranking.For example, the breast pump manufacturer would likely be willing to paymore to be listed first on the breast feeding document level node, thanon the pregnancy document level node. An end-user accessing documentsrelated to breast feeding is more likely to be in the market for abreast pump than any given end-user accessing pregnancy, in the mind ofthe advertiser. Thus, the advertising user has bid more to achieve thefirst position in that breast feeding document level. If the user is nothappy with the rank and bid amounts, the user may edit the listings.

FIG. 12 depicts a graphical user interface 1200 that enables anadvertising user to provide contact information according to anembodiment of the present invention. This contact information mayinclude any or none of the following information relating to the userdesiring advertising: first name, last name, company name, streetaddress, city, state, zip code, country, email address, phone number,fax number, and industry through inputs 1202, 1204, 1206, 1208, 1210,1212, 1214, 1216, 1218, 1220 and 1222, respectively. In otherembodiments any number of other pieces of information regarding the userdesiring advertising may be requested in this step.

FIG. 13 depicts a graphical user interface 1300 that enables anadvertising user to provide billing information according to anembodiment of the present invention. In one embodiment, the advertisinguser may enter a credit card or other financial account information thatwould enable automatic periodic billing by the system in input area1302. In other embodiments, the system may periodically generatephysical invoices, which are mailed to the advertiser. FIG. 13 shows anoption where the user may choose to enable “account auto replenish” ininput 1304. This feature allows the system to charge the user before anyadvertising expenses are actually incurred. The system charges a presetamount to the user's billing card whenever the user's account balancefalls to a certain amount. In this step, the user may also input theirbilling address in input area 1306.

FIG. 14 depicts a graphical user interface 1400 that enables a user toregister an account to list an advertisement on level nodes according toan embodiment of the present invention. This graphical user interfacerepresents an opportunity to make changes to the listings, contactinformation, or billing information prior to the listing becoming live.Once the advertising user takes this step and registers the listings,the advertisements are then placed according to their node structure onthe appropriate document level listings.

FIG. 15 is a schematic diagram representing an advertisement system 1500whereby an advertiser is enabled to list ads on content specific pagesaccording to varying levels of subject matter specificity, such asthrough the various embodiments depicted and described above. Multipleadvertiser systems 1510 may connect to the Internet via an httpconnection 1515 and access the advertisement system through servers1520. The http connection 1515 may be a secure one (https), if desired,although other security measures may also be utilized, such as describedabove. An advertiser system 1510 may access a database 1565 of contentspecificity via a database server 1525. Database server 1525 may providesoftware operations to interactively provide the graphical userinterfaces presented in the example embodiments above, receive contentfrom those graphical user interfaces, store the content into thedatabase and then provide subsequent error messages, or appropriateconfirmation messages. Database server 1525 may also sequence the pagesto the user based on predetermined relationship(s) between the graphicaluser interface pages shown. One example of how this may be accomplishedis through the database server reading and writing to a Content ObjectTable Database 1535 where advertisements associated with content may bestored. Furthermore, database server 1525 may enable the advertiser toread the Rule Table Database 1530, which may provide artificial systemlimitations regarding the listing of advertisements. These artificialsystem limitations may be rules designed to generate the highestprofitability from a business standpoint. For example, based on theuser's advertisement and subject matter, the system may recommend anadvertising combination to maximize their advertising effectiveness. Itshould be appreciated that although a single network file server,database server, content object table and rule table are depicted inFIG. 15, multiple such object may be provided for purposes ofscalability and optimization of the operations of this system.

When an advertiser system 1410 offers an amount for an ad listing, thatoffer may be stored in the Content Object Table Database 1435.Periodically, the Network File Server 1440 accesses the ads stored inthe Content Object Table Database 1435 via the Database Server 1425 andwrites them to the Structured Content Database 1465.

Additionally, multiple end users 1445 may connect via the Internet tovarious distribution partners to the multi-node hierarchicalcontent-based system's content. For example, the multi-node hierarchicalcontent-based system may be presented as a web site, such as theassignee of the present invention, About.com at www.about.com. Also,various partners of the host system may engage the host for purposes ofproviding some or all of the content on their web sites. For example, aweb site about Women's issues may desire to distribute the subject levelnode(s) related to women's issues. The advertisements associated withthose nodes may then be delivered along with the content for those nodesthrough the distribution partner to the end user over the Internet.

A load balancer 1450 may monitor the multiple Internet connections,including requests to the server from one or more distribution partners.Via web server(s) 1552, these multiple users may look for the contentfrom the multi-node hierarchical content-based system. These multipleusers 1445 may look for documents using the hierarchical node structureor by inputting search key words. In either case, the Network fileserver 1440 may read these requests 1455 and provide pages with relatedcontent along with the listings associated with that document. Thus theadvertisement system illustrated in FIG. 15 enables an advertiser tooffer an amount for ad placement on one content specific node, differentfrom the amount offered for placement on another content specific nodeless likely to generate sales.

Once the advertisement system has accepted offers for placement of adson a particular node, the advertisement system may publish those ads tothe content specific node. For example, those ad listings may bepublished to a website, as mentioned above. For example, adocument-level node may contain a single web page with informationalcontent, links, graphics, chat, and other features related to thesubject level, channel level and top level. Within that web page, someor all of the advertisers who placed ads for that level of specificitymay be displayed. FIG. 18, as discussed above, provides one example of asingle document-level node web page related to a document level node.That web page may be provided with the highest three bidders for thatdocument-level, including the highest bidders for the higher-levelnodes.

While the foregoing description includes details and specificities, itshould be understood that such details and specificities have beenincluded for the purposes of explanation only, and are not to beinterpreted as limitations of the present invention. Many modificationsto the embodiments described above can be made without departing fromthe spirit and scope of the invention, as it is intended to beencompassed by the following claims and their legal equivalents.

1. A computerized advertisement distribution and delivery systemcomprising one or more computers, the one or more computersimplementing: an advertisement image identification module foridentifying a first advertisement image, for identifying firstadvertisement rankings for a first plurality of advertisements relatedto a specific distribution subject, and for storing a plurality ofadvertisements including highest-ranked advertisements in the firstplurality of advertisements where storing includes storing the firstadvertisement image in association with a network-based locator; anaccess indication module for receiving an indication of a user accessingan email, wherein the email includes the network-based locator; anadvertisement relationship determination module for evaluating currentadvertisement rankings of the first plurality of advertisements inresponse to the user accessing the email, for determining that thecurrent advertisement rankings upon receiving the indication of the useraccessing the email are different than the first advertisement rankings,for initiating the advertisement image identification module to identifya modified advertisement image in response to determining that thecurrent advertisement rankings are different than the firstadvertisement rankings, wherein the modified advertisement imageincludes a second plurality of advertisements related to the specificdistribution subject including one or more then highest-rankedadvertisements, and for storing the modified advertisement image inassociation with the network-based locator; and an advertisement imagetransmission module for transmitting the modified advertisement imagefor inclusion in the email when the email is presented to the user. 2.The computerized advertisement distribution and delivery system of claim1, further comprising: an advertisement input receiving module forreceiving at least one advertisement associated with the specificdistribution subject and a bid representing an amount to be paid forclick-throughs by end-user recipients to a target site associated withthe at least one advertisement.
 3. The computerized advertisementdistribution and delivery system of claim 2, wherein the advertisementrankings are determined based at least in part on the bid associatedwith the at least one advertisement for the specific distributionsubject.
 4. The computerized advertisement distribution and deliverysystem of claim 1, wherein the advertisement relationship determinationmodule evaluates a grouping of advertisements based on an effectiverevenue efficiency of the grouping compared to other potential groupingsof advertisements provided by advertisers for the specific distributionsubject and determines the advertisement rankings for use in generatingthe advertisement image using a highest revenue efficiency grouping of apredetermined number of advertisements.
 5. The computerizedadvertisement distribution system of claim 4, wherein the effectiverevenue efficiency is calculated by multiplying a number ofclick-throughs over a predetermined number of impressions with a bidamount associated with an advertisement of the grouping.
 6. Thecomputerized advertisement distribution and delivery system of claim 4,wherein the advertisement relationship determination module determinesadvertisement rankings when revenue efficiency calculations are made. 7.The computerized advertisement distribution system of claim 1, whereinthe advertisement relationship determination module generates a rankingof listings as a grouping, the grouping comprising a ranked list ofadvertisements with a highest effective cost per thousand impressions.8. The computerized advertisement distribution and delivery system ofclaim 1, wherein the advertisement relationship determination moduledetermines advertisement rankings when any new bid value associated withan advertisement related to the specific distribution subject isreceived.
 9. The computerized advertisement distribution and deliverysystem of claim 1, wherein the electronic document comprises a targetnetwork-based locator for each advertisement in at least one of thefirst and second pluralities of advertisements and the system furthercomprising a redirection server for receiving a request at a targetnetwork-based location and redirecting the request to a locationassociated with an advertisement associated with the targetnetwork-based locator in the electronic document.
 10. The computerizedadvertisement distribution and delivery system of claim 1, wherein themodified advertisement image is a graphical image and advertisements areidentified in corresponding portions of the graphical image.
 11. Thecomputerized advertisement distribution and delivery system of claim 10,wherein the advertisements are identified in corresponding portions ofthe graphical image by an HTML image map.
 12. The computerizedadvertisement distribution and delivery system of claim 1, comprising:an electronic document transmission module for creating and transmittingthe electronic document containing content related to the specificdistribution subject, and containing the network-based locator; andwherein the request for an advertisement image is initiated by useraccess of the electronic document.
 13. The computerized advertisementdistribution and delivery system of claim 12, wherein the electronicdocument is an email.
 14. A computer-implemented method, comprising:identifying first advertisement rankings for a first plurality ofadvertisements related to a specific distribution subject; identifying afirst advertisement image including a plurality of advertisementsincluding highest-ranked advertisements in the first plurality ofadvertisements; identifying a stored location of the first advertisementimage in association with a network-based locator; providing an emailincluding the network-based locator; receiving an indication of a useraccessing the provided email; in response to receiving an indication ofthe user accessing the email, evaluating current advertisement rankingsof the first plurality of advertisements; determining that the currentadvertisement rankings upon receiving the indication of the useraccessing the email are different than the first advertisement rankings;in response to determining that the current advertisement rankings aredifferent than the first advertisement rankings, identifying a modifiedadvertisement image, wherein the modified advertisement image identifiesa second plurality of advertisements related to the specificdistribution subject, including one or more current highest-rankedadvertisements of the first plurality of advertisements; storing themodified advertisement image in association with the network-basedlocator; and providing the modified advertisement image for inclusion inthe email when the email is presented to the user; wherein thereceiving, evaluating and transmitting are performed by one or morecomputers.
 15. The method of claim 14, further comprising: evaluating agrouping of advertisements based on an effective revenue efficiency ofthe grouping compared to other potential groupings of advertisementsprovided by advertisers for the specific distribution subject anddetermining advertisement rankings for use in generating anadvertisement image using a highest revenue efficiency grouping of apredetermined number of advertisements.
 16. The method of claim 15,wherein the advertisement rankings are determined based at least in parton a bid value of associated with an advertisement for the specificdistribution subject.
 17. The method of claim 15, wherein the effectiverevenue efficiency is calculated by multiplying a number ofclick-throughs over a predetermined number of impressions with a bidamount associated with an advertisement of the grouping.
 18. The methodof claim 15, wherein advertisement rankings are determined when any newbid value associated with an advertisement related to the specificdistribution subject is received.
 19. The method of claim 15, whereinadvertisement rankings are determined when revenue efficiencycalculations are made.
 20. The method of claim 15, wherein theelectronic document comprises a target network-based locator for eachadvertisement in at least one of the first and second pluralities ofadvertisements and the method further comprising receiving a request ata target network-based location and redirecting the request to alocation associated with an advertisement associated with the targetnetwork-based locator in the electronic document.
 21. The method ofclaim 14, further comprising generating a ranking of listings as agrouping, the grouping comprising a ranked list of advertisements with ahighest effective cost per thousand impressions.
 22. A systemcomprising: one or more computers; and a computer-readable mediumcoupled to the one or more computers having instructions stored thereonwhich, when executed by the one or more computers, cause the one or morecomputers to perform operations comprising: identifying firstadvertisement rankings for a first plurality of advertisements relatedto a specific distribution subject; identifying a first advertisementimage including a plurality of advertisements including highest-rankedadvertisements; identifying a stored location of the first advertisementimage in association with a network-based locator; providing an emailincluding the network based locator; receiving an indication of a userprovided email; in response to receiving an indication of the useraccessing the email, evaluating current advertisement rankings of thefirst plurality of advertisements; determining that the currentadvertisement rankings upon receiving the indication of the useraccessing the email are different than the first advertisement rankings;in response to determining that the current advertisement rankings aredifferent than the first advertisement rankings, identifying a modifiedadvertisement image, wherein the modified advertisement image identifiesa second plurality of advertisements related to the specificdistribution subject and includes a plurality of advertisementsincluding one or more current highest-ranked advertisements; storing themodified advertisement image in association with the network-basedlocator; and providing the modified advertisement image for inclusion inthe email when the email is presented to the user.
 23. A computerstorage medium encoded with a computer program, the program comprisinginstructions that when executed by data processing apparatus cause thedata processing apparatus to perform operations comprising: identifyingfirst advertisement rankings for a first plurality of advertisementsrelated to a specific distribution subject; identifying a firstadvertisement image including a plurality of advertisements includinghighest-ranked advertisements in the first plurality of advertisements;identifying a stored location of the first advertisement image inassociation with a network-based locator; providing an email includingthe network-based locator; receiving an indication of a user accessingthe provided email; in response to receiving an indication of the useraccessing the email, evaluating current advertisement rankings of thefirst plurality of advertisements; determining that the currentadvertisement rankings upon receiving the indication of the useraccessing the email are different than the first advertisement rankings;in response to determining that the current advertisement rankings aredifferent than the first advertisement rankings, identifying a modifiedadvertisement image, wherein the modified advertisement image identifiesa second plurality of advertisements related to the specificdistribution subject, including one or more current highest-rankedadvertisements of the first plurality of advertisements; storing themodified advertisement image in association with the network-basedlocator; and providing the modified advertisement image for inclusion inthe email when the email is presented to the user.
 24. A method,comprising: identifying a plurality of advertisements associated with adistribution subject; determining a first ranking of the plurality ofadvertisements; storing an association between a first advertisement asa highest-ranked advertisement, the storing including associating thefirst advertisement with a network-based locator; providing an emailincluding the network-based locator; receiving an indication of a useraccessing the email; determining a second ranking of the plurality ofadvertisements; determining that the first ranking of the plurality ofadvertisements upon receiving the indication of the user accessing theemail is different from the second ranking of the plurality ofadvertisements; in response to determining that the first ranking of theplurality of advertisements is different than the second ranking of theplurality of advertisements, storing a second advertisement as thehighest-ranked advertisement, the storing including associating thesecond advertisement with the network based locator; and providing thesecond advertisement for inclusion in the email upon receiving theindication of the user accessing the email, wherein the identifying,ranking, and providing are performed by one or more computers.